The empty cups, cans, and other trash the kids had left behind in the living room. The library safe Ian and Zoe had tried to break into. The overturned furniture, bloody rugs, and other destruction from the office fight. Several footprints in the mud in the woods outside the mansion. Even a set of tire tracks from where Lance and Drake had peeled away in their getaway car.
The photos tracked the mission from beginning to end, but I found myself going back to the shots that showed the office. One picture of the desk caught my eye, showing all the items Lance had pulled out of the drawer. Pens, pencils, and paper clips were strewn all over the top of the desk, and papers littered the floor all around it. Nothing out of the ordinary, except for Drake’s black Reaper mask, with those large, creepy red diamond shapes over the eyes. But even that was just a simple harlequin mask, the kind you could buy in any costume shop.
Still, something about the photo bothered me, like there was an obvious clue in the jumble of objects that I should be picking up on. I kept scanning the photo, studying every single part of it, just like I would go back and reread certain passages two or three times whenever I was reading a really good mystery and trying to figure out whodunit. But this was far more important than the satisfaction of figuring out who the villain was before the end of a book.
“What is it?” Zoe asked, nudging me with her elbow. “You’ve been staring at that same photo for the last five minutes.”
“I’m not sure. Hey, Mateo. Can you put this up on one of the monitors?”
I slid the photo across the table to him. Mateo glanced at the reference number stamped on the back and hit some keys on his laptop. A second later, the photo popped up on the center wall monitor. I got up, walked around the table, and stopped in front of the screen so I could have an even better look at the photo.
“What do you see, Rory?” Ian asked.
I shook my head. “I don’t know yet.”
I stalked back and forth in front of the monitor, examining the photo from top to bottom and side to side. The wooden desk. The pens and pencils strewn across the glossy surface. Drake’s Reaper mask perched next to a wad of paper clips. The long, slender papers lying on the floor beside the desk—
My eyes narrowed, and I stopped in front of that part of the photo. Papers…something about those papers…
I remembered Lance reaching into the drawer, pulling out a handful of papers, and tossing them on top of the desk. The papers had slipped off and landed on the floor, and I’d snuck a glance at them. But they hadn’t been papers at all—they’d been tickets.
And just like that, I knew the clue that solved the mystery.
I stabbed my finger at the monitor. “Those are tickets to the Fall Costume Ball. Lance pulled them out while he was rooting around inside the desk for the chimera scepter.”
Zoe frowned. “So what?”
“So Lance had more than half a dozen tickets. Not just one or two for himself and a date. Why would he have so many tickets printed out? Especially when they get emailed to people’s phones too? Unless…”
“Unless he was going to invite all his Reaper friends to crash the costume ball.” Ian finished my thought.
“Exactly.”
Takeda looked at Mateo. “Where’s the costume ball going to be this year?”
Mateo’s fingers flew across his laptop. “Looks like the ball is being held this weekend at…the Cormac Museum.”
He kept typing, and photos of the museum appeared on the monitors one after another. The more pictures appeared, the more certain I was that Lance, Drake, and Sisyphus were targeting the museum.
Because it was filled with artifacts.
Weapons, armor, jewelry, clothing, paintings, statues, and more flashed by on the screens, almost too fast for me to follow. I waved my hand at the monitors.
“That’s what makes this place so special,” I said. “Lance and Drake must be planning to use the costume ball as a cover so they can sneak into the museum and steal whatever artifact Sisyphus wants. Maybe even multiple artifacts, given how many are there.”
“And the chimera scepter?” Mateo asked. “What are the Reapers planning to do with that?”
Takeda stared at the monitors. “The same thing they did at Lance Fuller’s mansion: use it to cover their escape. The Reapers were probably hoping they could slip into the museum during the ball, steal the artifacts, and vanish before anyone realized what was happening, just like they did during the battle at the North Carolina academy. But Sisyphus is smart. He knew the Protectorate might figure out what he was up to, so that’s why he had Lance steal the chimera scepter—as insurance. So Lance can summon more monsters and stop anyone who tries to get in the Reapers’ way.”
I thought of how easily Lance had waved the scepter and made those chimeras appear in the office last night. Facing down those monsters would be a tall task for anyone, even Protectorate guards, making it that much easier for the Reapers to escape in the chaos and confusion.
“Do you think Sisyphus will be there?” Zoe asked.
“He’ll be there,” I said. “He’s gone to a lot of trouble to set things up. Working with Drake, having Lance steal the chimera scepter from the library, trying to kill us at the mansion last night. He won’t want to miss the grand finale of his evil plan.”
I couldn’t explain how I knew the Reaper leader would be there, but I did. I could feel it deep down in my bones.
“Rory’s right,” Takeda said. “Sisyphus will most likely be there to oversee the operation, which means that this is our chance to finally take him down. Now that we know what the Reapers are up to, let’s see if we can figure out which artifacts they might be after.”
Mateo hacked into the Cormac Museum’s computer system and printed out a master list of all the artifacts on display, along with photos and the location of each object. He split the list and the photos into five stacks, and we all sat at the table and studied the information.
The museum housed dozens of swords, daggers, spears, axes, and other weapons, along with a fair share of armor, everything from helmets to breastplates to gauntlets. Still, I couldn’t help but feel those items were way too obvious. Swords and armor could be found at myth-history museums all across the country, places the Reapers could break into at any time. So what artifact was so special, so powerful, so one-of-a-kind that Sisyphus was willing to risk being caught by the Protectorate to get his greedy hands on it? And what did he plan to do with the artifact once he had it? Those were the most important questions, but try as I might, I couldn’t puzzle out the answers.
And neither could the others. An hour passed, then two, and none of us could pinpoint which artifacts the Reapers might want or why.
“All right,” Takeda finally said, scrubbing his hands over his face. “That’s enough for tonight. We’ll come back at this tomorrow with fresh eyes.”
We gathered up our things and left the Bunker. The others headed back to their dorm rooms for the night, but I was too restless to go home, so I stayed behind in the library, and I wound up at Sigyn’s statue on the second floor.
I sat on the floor across from the statue and stared at the goddess, but her stone face remained still and frozen. Ever since she’d first appeared to me in that dream realm at the Eir Ruins, I had been on the lookout for Sigyn, expecting the goddess to be lurking somewhere in the library, either as herself or as the old woman Raven, but the only glimpse of Sigyn that I’d seen had been her statue. I wondered if I was doing what the goddess wanted by joining the Midgard and hunting down Lance, Drake, and Sisyphus or if she had some other job in mind for me, some task that I hadn’t even considered yet. No way to know for sure.
“What are you thinking about, Rory?” A familiar voice cut into my thoughts.
I looked over at Babs, whom I’d propped up against the wall beside me. Once again, the sword had been quiet all day, as if she’d been utterly exhausted by the fight with the Reapers and chimeras last night. She hadn’t said a single word during my cla
sses, lunch, or even the briefing. But now her green eye was open and fixed on mine.
“Did you hear us talking in the Bunker?” I asked.
Babs rolled her eye. “Of course I did. Just because my eye’s closed doesn’t mean I’m not listening.”
“Well, I was thinking about the mission and the artifacts the Reapers might be after.”
“But that’s not what’s really bothering you, is it?”
I shook my head. “I keep thinking about everything Lance said last night and how he tried to recruit me to become a Reaper.”
“So?”
“So Lance isn’t the one giving the orders—Sisyphus is. That means that Sisyphus told Lance to recruit me. But why? I’ve never even met this Sisyphus person, so why would he want me to become a Reaper? It doesn’t make any sense. I don’t know anything about Sisyphus, but he seems to know everything about me.”
“Maybe Sisyphus has heard what a great warrior you are,” Babs suggested. “Everyone knows that you fought at the Battle of Mythos Academy. You know that Reapers covet power more than anything else. Sisyphus probably thinks he can defeat the Protectorate if he has a strong warrior like you on his side.”
“Maybe. But I still feel like I’m missing something important about this whole situation.”
Sympathy flashed in Babs’s gaze. She opened her mouth, then abruptly closed it again.
“What?” I asked. “What were you going to say?”
“Well, I hate to bring this up, especially since you’re already feeling a little down…”
“Bring what up?”
The sword winced. “Sisyphus isn’t the only thing you need to worry about.”
“What else is there?”
Her wince deepened. “My curse.”
With everything that had happened over the past day, I had forgotten about Babs’s curse and how it affected every warrior who wielded her.
“Last night, when I fought Lance, Drake, and the chimeras, that was my second time using you in battle,” I said.
I hadn’t even thought about the curse, much less not using Babs during the fight. The only things I had been worried about were protecting Ian and Zoe and taking down the Reapers before they hurt anyone else. But I had used Babs in the fight, which made me one step closer to being the next victim of her curse.
“Yes, that was the second battle. That means you only have one battle left before…before you die.” The sword’s voice dropped to an anguished whisper, and a tear gleamed in her eye.
My stomach twisted with dread. And I had just made plans to be part of a third battle by agreeing to take down Lance, Drake, and Sisyphus during the Fall Costume Ball. Even if we managed to corner the Reapers, they wouldn’t go down without a fight.
Maybe it was morbid, but I wondered exactly how the curse would kill me. Would Lance get in a lucky strike with a sword? Would Drake wound me with a poisoned weapon? Or would I fall victim to some weird, random bout of extremely bad luck, like tripping, plunging down a flight of stairs, and breaking my neck seconds after the battle was finished?
More dread swirled through me, along with a touch of fear. I might be a warrior, but I didn’t want to die. Not like this. Not because of some curse that I had no idea how to fight.
“I’m sorry, Rory,” Babs whispered, a tear streaking down her face. “So sorry. I never meant for any of this to happen to you.”
Seeing how upset she was reminded me that I wasn’t the only one affected by the curse. Babs had been through this with other warriors before me, and she had watched them all die just because they had picked her up. Determination surged through me, drowning out my dread. Well, she wasn’t going to suffer through that guilt and heartbreak again. Not if I could help it.
Spartans never, ever gave up.
“Don’t worry,” I said, gently wiping the tear off her blade. “I still have time to figure this out. We’re in the Library of Antiquities, remember? There has to be something here that can help us break your curse.”
“Do you really think so?” Babs’s voice quavered with a faint bit of hope.
“Yes, and we’re going to get started right now.”
I got to my feet, buckled Babs’s scabbard to my belt, and grabbed my messenger bag from the floor. Then I looked at Sigyn’s statue.
Once again, I wondered why the goddess had arranged for my path to cross Babs’s, and I stared at her marble face, hoping she might give me some small clue or sign that I was on the right track, that there was some way to help Babs and myself. But Sigyn’s features remained as still and remote as before. No help there. At least, not right now. So I hoisted my bag onto my shoulder, turned, and left the goddess behind.
I had a curse to break.
Chapter Twenty
I stayed in the library until closing time, searching through the computer databases, but I didn’t find any books or artifacts about breaking curses.
I would have stayed even later, but the librarians rounded up all the students and made us leave before locking the doors behind us. Frustration filled me, even though I knew that the improved security measures were Takeda’s doing and that they were for the best to protect everything inside the library. But I had no choice but to go home for the night.
Despite everything that had happened with Lance, Drake, and the Reapers, the next few days were surprisingly normal. Well, as normal as they could be considering the fact that I kept wondering if everyone around me was a Reaper and spying on me for the mysterious Sisyphus. But that was just life at Mythos Academy.
I went about my routine as though everything was fine. Morning classes, lunch with the others in the dining hall, afternoon classes, then prepping for the mission with everyone in the Bunker. As the days passed, I realized that everything really was fine. Well, except for Babs’s curse, which I spent every night researching in the library, although I didn’t have any luck finding anything to help the sword or keep me from dying. But that was the only black spot in my days.
I’d had more fun hanging out with Ian, Zoe, and Mateo this past week than I’d had since my parents were exposed as Reapers. Even Takeda, with his annoyingly calm demeanor and love of classical music, was slowly growing on me. Plus, being on the Midgard gave me a sense of purpose, like I was making a difference, like my actions would protect people. But most of all, being on the team made me feel like I was my own person—and not just the despised daughter of murdered Reaper assassins.
I was going to be so sad when we finished the mission and they all went back to their regular lives in New York. But I tried not to think about it too much, and before I knew it, it was the day of the Fall Costume Ball.
Takeda had told Linus Quinn what we thought the Reapers were up to, and Linus had decided to let the ball take place as planned, since it was the Protectorate’s best chance to capture Sisyphus and put a stop to this new brewing war with the Reapers. So on Saturday afternoon, I was in the Bunker, going over our final strategy to catch Lance, Drake, and Sisyphus at the museum tonight.
Mateo hit some buttons on his laptop, and photos of the inside of the Cormac Museum popped up on the wall monitors. I stifled a groan. They were the exact same photos we’d been studying for days now, and I had stared at them for so long that I’d started seeing them in my sleep.
Takeda stood in his usual spot at the head of the briefing table. “As you know, the safety of the Mythos students is our top priority tonight, even above capturing Lance, Drake, and any other Reapers who might be there. Dozens of Protectorate guards will be hidden throughout the grounds, and others will be patrolling inside the museum, dressed in costumes like all the other regular academy chaperones.”
Photos flashed by of all the Protectorate guards. I knew their faces as well as I knew the inside of the museum now.
“I will be attending the ball as a chaperone, while the four of you go in as regular students,” Takeda continued. “Your job is to mix and mingle and keep an eye out for Lance, Drake, or anyone you think might be Sisyphus. T
he second you spot one of them, you will let me know on comms, and the Protectorate guards will move in. The four of you can observe the Reapers, but you are not to engage them unless absolutely necessary. Let the guards do their jobs. Okay?”
“Okay,” we all murmured back to him, although Ian’s response was a little slow and surly.
I looked at Ian, who was staring at the monitor. His face was calm, but a muscle ticked in his jaw, and his hand slowly curled into a fist on top of the table. We hadn’t talked much since that night at the Eir Ruins, but it was obvious that Ian wanted to confront Drake at the museum. I would have felt the same way if my parents were going to be there. I wondered if the Viking would be able to stop himself from charging after his brother.
I’d find out tonight.
We reviewed a few final details, then split up and went our separate ways to get ready. Like it or not, this was a costume ball, and we would be far too obvious if we didn’t dress up. Ian, Mateo, and Takeda had gotten their costumes from a shop in Snowline Ridge, but Zoe was creating her own. The Valkyrie liked making clothes as much as she liked inventing gadgets, and she’d spent the last few days designing and sewing.
I had been planning to wear an old green party dress, along with a cheap plastic tiara, for a quick and easy princess costume, but Zoe was horrified by my lack of imagination, and she insisted on giving my costume a serious upgrade. I told her I was fine being a generic princess and that she shouldn’t go to so much trouble, but she was determined to work her creative magic on me. I’d tried to sneak into her dorm room to see what she was doing, but Zoe wouldn’t let me in, saying she wanted our costumes to be a surprise.
An hour later, a knock sounded on my bedroom door, and Aunt Rachel stepped inside. She was attending the ball tonight as a chaperone, although she was really going to help Takeda and keep an eye out for the Reapers.